20 July 2013

Better than Bangladesh

My parents have
been visiting.Their return to Australia was via a
stopover in Singapore after one of their annual and epic tours of Europe. The
spending of my inheritance. They paused in Singapore to visit me - their eldest
and prodigal son. I am the last leg - well Singapore is. Their latest trip was
to Italy and Turkey where they cruised and toured all around the place and then
flew here direct from Istanbul. They left this morning and I miss them already. I love them dearly and I enjoyed their company.

I really did.

My Mum and Dad
have been to Singapore many times before. The old boy was in the Australian
Army for most of his adult life and for all of my childhood. He retired as a
Colonel. We moved around a lot when we were kids and I was actually born in
Malaysia - on an army base. I was an army brat.

Now I am just
a brat.

Dad did two
tours of Vietnam when I was a little boy. These were different from his recent
holiday tours. They were much different because there was a war going on then.
The Americans delusional paranoia of Communism elicited their invasion of this
foreign land with weapons of mass destruction and the Australian Army followed
suit. Things haven't changed much in fifty years.The phobia now is of Islamic extremists. Bombs are still dropped and innocents are killed.

It feels like the world has gone mad at times.

It is an
abomination.

I remember
watching footage of the Vietnam war on television when I was a little boy and
crying a lot.I wept because my Dad was over there in Vietnam and terrible and
frightening things were happening.I think my Mum cried a lot too. They were
timorous times. I learned far too young that the dread of losing your father
permeated all of one's senses. It was a harsh lesson for a little boy and it
wasn't fear - it was terror. It tasted of malevolence and it smelt of atrophy. It
was a black fog of despair that consumed me.

Dad doesn't
talk about his time in Vietnam and I don't ask him about it anymore. I think we
both agree and accept that war is loathsome and abhorrent and senseless.

Mum and Dad
and I walked around Singapore a lot while they were here. Many new buildings
have gone up since their last visit. Beautiful buildings. Singapore is becoming
an architecturally splendid city of international renown. The Marina Bay Sands,
the Arts Centre, the Louis Vuitton Building and the almost unbelievable Cloud
Forest Dome at the new Gardens by the Bay are sights to behold.

They cost
billions of dollars.

The
construction industry is still booming on the Island. The construction workers
in Singapore are predominantly from Bangladesh. They are here on work visas and
toil extremely hard and in very difficult conditions. To do any manual labor
outdoors in the incessant heat and near saturating humidity that prevails here
is unthinkable to me. I could not do it. I struggle just walking around.

My Mum was a
bit taken aback when we walked down near Marine Parade and we saw a couple of
Bangladeshi guys asleep on the pavement. I told my Mum not to be alarmed.

I said, "Don't
worry Mum. Don't panic" and I then explained the Bangladeshi
construction labour story to her. She had no idea. I told my Mum that these poor
blokes had likely been working since 6am and would be doing a fourteen hour
shift. I told her that they did this every day and they were just trying to
catch a few moments sleep. They were exhausted.

It is also now Ramadan and these workers would not have taken their lunch.

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar. It is a four week period of prayer and charity and fasting for those of the Muslim faith.

Fasting is the act of not eating - it is not the act of moving very quickly. That is just going fast.

During the Ramadan period people of the Islamic faith are not permitted to eat between sunrise and sunset. The pre-sunrise meal is called suhoor and the post sunset meal is called iftar.

The act of fasting is one of the five pillars of Islam and it is also a time for self contemplation and charity. Those of the Islamic faith will often help out the needy during Ramadan. Largesse is encouraged in the teachings of the Islamic holy book the Qur'an. I think this is very nice. I think it is beautiful. We should all do it all of the time. The world would be a better place.

I have chatted quite a bit to a number of the Bangladeshi construction boys during my tenure here in Singapore. We had large teams of them working on some big building projects that we did for my Employer. I also used to yack to them when I lived out on the East Coast of the Island as my house was adjacent to a park where some Bangladeshi men often chose to sit and sleep on Sundays. Sunday is their only day off. It is a six day working week here in the Singaporean construction industry.

I have been to Bangladesh. Dhaka is the capital city. The country has a population of more than one hundred and fifty million people and paucity is endemic. Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated nations on the planet and it is also one of the most impoverished. The national language is Bengali however despite the lack of opportunity for education - many also speak very good English.

I was just traveling around the place when I went to Bangladesh. I was exploring the world and I wasn't working at the time. I was trying to find myself as well. It was a long time ago. I never succeeded in finding myself but I am still seeking. I am beginning to think that the search is futile however I shall persist for I am as stubborn as I am curious.

I inherited this from my Dad.

There are bits of him in me.

One of the main things that I wanted to see in Bangladesh were the ship graveyards of Chittagong beach and I did see them. They were amazing. Chittagong is a place where old ships go to die. Massive and redundant ships of all types sail their last voyage to Chittagong from all around the world. It is their death cruise. When they arrive they are dismantled piece by piece in Chittagong and it is referred to as "Ship Breaking".

Chittagong is the second biggest facility of it's type in the world. If you want to know where the biggest facility is you will need to look it up. I can state with some degree of smugness that I know where it is located. Thousands of Bangladeshis cut these ships apart at Chittagong and the steel is recycled. Chittagong beach is an environmental catastrophe but it is a sight to behold.

The Bangladeshi people that I have met in Dhaka and Chittagong and here in Singapore are all kind and hospitable people. They are delightful in fact. The nation is impoverished but like many of the Third World countries that I have visited the generosity of the people is extraordinary. In Bangladesh I was constantly touched by heartfelt acts of benevolence. I was regularly invited to share meals of fiery but delicious curries with families who lived together in one small room. I was offered and drank sweet tea with them and we talked a lot about the game of cricket. Bangladeshi men and boys love cricket.

So do I.

I learned much about humility and respect and decency in my stay in Bangladesh and I learned much about myself too.

The Chittagong ship graveyard started by accident more than fifty years ago. It started after a massive cyclone blew a Greek merchant ship ashore and beached it at Chittagong. It was unable to be refloated and it sat there for years. In 1965 a local steel company bought the ship and they got it for a song. They then 'scrapped' it. It took more than three years but it begat an industry – a very big one for Bangladesh.

The Bangladeshi laborers here in Singapore share their accommodations with their co-workers and up to a dozen of them sleep on roll-up mattresses in a single room. Their Singaporean Employers arrange for the Workers transportation to and from construction sites each day in trucks. The average pay rate is about $4 an hour. This is about a third of what a sixteen year old might earn working in a McDonalds in places like Australia or the UK for flipping burgers.

Despite this minimalist of minimum wages the guys from Bangladesh save all that they can and they send it back to their families. On any given Sunday long and patient lines of them can be seen at the Western Union offices in the Little India district of Singapore. They send their wages back to Bangladesh to feed their families who would otherwise starve.

It is the children of impoverished nations that suffer the most. Starvation and malnutrition related diseases are the primary causes of mortality amongst infants in Bangladesh.

It is heart breaking.

As I have already mentioned - in the small park that was next to my house on the East coast of Singapore there were always groups of Bangladeshi construction workers resting and sleeping on Sundays - under the shade of the beautiful banyan trees. I often repeat myself.I often repeat myself.The Bangladeshi guys would sometimes chat in small groups and lay out picnics. I used to walk my old Golden Retriever Bob in the park and as I strolled past groups of these guys I would say "Nomoskar".

This is a polite way of saying "Hello how are you?" in Bengali. I learned this in Chittagong.

The Bangladeshis who I befriended would always reply with big grins and say "Nomoskar. Apni keamon arsen?"

This is "Hello. Are you well?".

In return I would deliver an "Ami halo arsi".

This is Bengali for "I am well"

This is simple and polite Bengali formalities and civilities. Then we would converse in English because that was all the Bengali I had. The guys seemed very pleased that I had been to their country.

When I got to know them a little better we talked about all sorts of things. We chatted about cricket and families and children and the ship graveyards of Chittagong. I told them that I thought that the jobs they had here in Singapore must be very difficult given the heat and humidity. I told them that I thought that life must be very tough for them.

They replied to me that it wasn't easy being away from their families but they were used to hard work and heat. They told me that they thought they were very lucky to be in a place as nice as Singapore and that their lives weren't so bad. They pointed out to me that they could sit under the shade of a Banyan tree here in a beautiful lush green park on their day off and they could drink chai with their friends.